During the first days following the birth of your baby, your breasts begin producing colostrum, although your body began making it long before that - between three and four months of pregnancy. Colostrum doesn't have many calories, but it has the right amount of protein and other nutrients your baby needs in the first few days after birth.

During those first days after birth, you may worry that your breast fed baby may dry up and blow away from lack of nutrition, but what colostrum lacks in volume it makes up for in power. It is exactly what your baby needs for it's first milk. It is full of antibodies and immunoglobulins, which not only help protect your baby as it comes into this world of bacteria and viruses, but it also has a laxative effect that helps baby pass the tarry first stool called meconium.

It is a common misconception that when the baby nurses in the first day or two, that he gets nothing. Luckily this is not true. It is however, difficult to convince some mothers of the need to nurse early and often when they believe that their "milk has not come in."

In addition some cultures hold the belief that colostrum is "bad" milk and will not breastfeed until the mother's mature milk is in. Many women have to be engorged before they will believe that there is any milk for the baby. Likewise, if the mother is no longer engorged, she may falsely believe that her milk is gone.

Expressing a drop or two of colostrum for the mother will give her a strong visual cue that her breasts are not empty. The mother produces small amounts of colostrum in the first 24 hours; ranging from 7 ml to 123 ml. The newborn takes 7-14 ml per feeding (Riordan and Auerbach, 124).

A gradual increase occurs during the first day and a half followed by a dramatic increase in milk output by the second day that continues through day four. At 5 days postpartum milk production is approximately 500 ml/24 hours. This is evidence that mother nature intended the infant's gastrointestinal tract to start up slowly after birth.

**As a result of observing that immigrant Bengali women in a London maternity ward failed to initiate breast feeding for a few days after birth, the author of this article decided to study this phenomenon. A review of the literature revealed that prelacteal feeds are common in the Indian subcontinent and in Egypt.

**Most UK studies of breast-feeding practices of Asian immigrants focus on the decline in breast-feeding prevalence. No research was found that directly investigates attitudes and beliefs about colostrum.

**The current study sought to determine what Bengali women believe about colostrum, why colostrum is omitted from early feeding, the duration of this omission, and what influences this belief and behavior.

**Data were gathered from 60 first-generation immigrants (58 non-English speaking), including 48 who had previously given birth in Bangladesh. Only two of the women surveyed knew that colostrum had helpful attributes. Others felt that it would either provide no benefit to their baby or would actually harm the infant.

**Source: MIDWIVES. 1997 Jan;110(1308):3-7.

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